Kalah
Kalah → German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish. Kalah was invented by William Julius Champion Jr., a graduate of Yale University, in 1940. In 1905, he came across an article about a mancala game and it appears that he read many more ethnological works on African and Asian mancala games in later years. W. J. Champion started to sell his game in 1944, patented it in 1952 (design) and 1955 (rules) and then founded in 1958 the Kalah Game Company in Holbrook, Massachusetts (USA). Kalah was produced by them well into the 1970s and the name of the game was a registered trademark from 1970-2002. Champion promoted the game in local schools for educational purposes and, in 1963, there was even a Kalah championship organized at the Coolidge School in Holbrook, which was won by Ira Burnim. In 1960, a first computerized version was developed at the M.I.T. by Wiley and many others followed. In Germany, Paul Erich Frielinghaus, today a well-known actor, but at this time still a High School student, developped in 1978 a Kalah program (he called the game serata), which won the first prize in the German Research Competition Jugend forscht (i.e. "youth is doing research"). The game was strongly solved (according to Allis definition) for small instances using full-game databases and weakly for larger instances by Jeroen Donkers et al. in 2001. If played perfectly, it is usually (it depends on the number of seeds in each hole and the number of holes per row) a first players win. The Swedish Björn Myrvold has written in 2002 a strong Kalah applet. Although the game was patented, it had been copycatted many times: Conference (Mieg's, 1965), Sahara (Pelikan, 1976) and Bantumi (Nokia, 2000). Kalah is used by the Kellog Electronic Research Academy in Chicago to help students who are suffering under dyscalculia. Kalah is very popular in the United States, where it is often just called Mancala. In Germany, it is known as Kalaha. Every year there are more than 50 tournaments in the USA, mostly for children. The game has no African origins despite many claims to the contrary, even by its inventor, because there is no such game in the whole of Africa. However, Kalah suspiciously resembles games played by the Malay people and could be described as single-lap Dakon (Dakon is a Javanese mancala game). Kalah means in Timorese "to defeat". All modern mancala variants, which were commercialized in western countries before 1960, are minor modifications of traditional games. Although they often claim to be ancient, it can be shown that they are, in fact, of rather recent origin. Kalah is for sure not a Sumerian invention, 7,000 years old, as stated by W. J. Champion. The version called Conference, published in Germany, was inspired by boards kept in Castle Weikersheim. Rules Kalah is played on a board of two rows, each consisting of six round pits that have a large store at either end called kalah. A player owns the six pits closest to him and the kalah on his right side. Beginners may start with three seeds in each pit, but the game becomes more and more challenging by starting with 4, 5 or up to 6 pieces in each pit. Today, four seeds per hole has become the most common variant, but Champion recommended the expert game Most Challenging Set-up (Expert Game) Play is counterclockwise. The seeds are distributed one by one in the pits and the players own kalah, but not into the opponent's store. If the last seed is dropped into an opponent's pit or a non-empty pit of the player, the move ends without anything being captured. If the last seed falls into the player's kalah, he must move again. If the last seed is put into an empty pit owned by the player, he captures all contents of the opposite pit together with the capturing piece and puts them in his kalah. If the opposite pit is empty, nothing is captured. A capture ends the move. The game ends when a player has no legal move and the remaining pieces are captured by his adversary. The player who has captured most pieces is declared the winner. The first player has a big advantage. However, the game can be balanced with the pie rule. According to ig Game Center statistics the rate of draws in online play is 9% (two draws were faked). Variations Many "house rules" exist as there is no governing body which defines the "official" rules: * The "Empty Capture" variant permits to capture the last seed when landing in an empty hole on the player's own side even when the opposite hole of the adversary is empty. * An alternate rule does not count the remaining seeds as part of the score at the end of the game. Sample Games Game 1 The following game was played between Arty Sandler (Israel) and Ralf Gering (Germany) on June 11, 2008. Each hole contained six seeds at the start. The pie rule was used to make the game fair. Sandler moved first. 1. d(+1)* F(+1) - no pie; 2. e(+1) F-B(+2) 3. f(+1) A(+1); 4. d(+3) D(+3) 5. c(+1) D; 6. f-e-f-b(+4) C(+6) 7. e-c(+2) E-D-E-F(+5); 8. e-d-a(+3) F-A-F-E-F-C-F-D-F-E-F-B(+13) 9. e-b-c-e-d-f(+8) F-E-F-D(+5); 10. e-f(+4) C 11. b E-F-D(+2); 12. c E 13. e F(+1). The two remaining seeds are awarded to Sandler. Gering wins by 6 points. * a-x(+2) would result in switching as this move gives the first player a too big advantage. Game 2 The following game was played between Ralf Gering (Germany) and Olivier Millé (Spain) on May 30, 2009. Each hole contained six seeds at the start. The pie rule was used to make the game fair. Gering moved first. 1. f(+1) C(+1) - no pie; 2. c(+1) E(+1); 3. a(+1) D(+1); 4. c B(+1); 5. b(+1) E(+1); 6. d(+6) D-B(+5); 7. e(+3) F(+2); 8. f(+1) D-C-A(+3); 9. f-e-f-d-f-e(+7) F(+1); 10. d!(+5) D(+11); 11. c-f-b-f-e-f-d(+6) C(+2); 12. f-e(+1) E(+4); 13. a F(+1) The five remaining seeds are awarded to Gering. Gering wins by 4 points. Game 3 The following game was played between Maria do Céu Rodrigues Aguiar Lopes Tavares (Portugal) and Ralf Gering (Germany) on January 24, 2010. The pie rule was used to make the game fair. Tavares moved first. 1. b(+1) F(+1); 2. c(+1) C(+1); 3. c F-A(+2); 4. e(+1) B(+1); 5. c D(+3); 6. d(+6) F(+1); 7. b(+1) A; 8. e-a(+2) F-D-F-E-B-E-C-D-E-A(+15)*; 9. e-b(+3) F(+1); 10. a (+33)** * "Greed ruins gentlemen." ** b, d and e works too. Tavares wins by 24 points. Kalah Problem South to play and capture 18 seeds. References ;Ahlschwede, J.: Using Genetic Programming to Play Mancala. Doane College, Crete NE (USA) 2000. ;Anonymous.: PDP Application Note: Kalah. Digital Equipment Corporation, Maynard MA (USA) 1961. ;Anonymous.: Kalah: Pit & Pebbles. In: Time Magazine June 14, 1963: 67. ;Anonymous.: Kalah Recognized as Valuable Educational Aid - 350 Students Participate in Tournament: Kalah Sweeps Coolidge School. In: Melrose Free Press December 19, 1963. ;Anonymous.: Kalah: A Commercial Count and Capture Game. Museum of Waterloo, London (Ontario, Canada) July 30, 2001. ;Anonymous.: TAG Students Finish Tournament. In: Blanco County News March 16, 2011. ;Bell, A. G.: Kalah on Atlas. In: Mitchie, D. (Ed.). Machine Intelligence 3. University Press, Edinburgh (Scotland) 1968, 181-193. ;Betten, D.: Kalahari and the Sequence "Sloane No. 377". In: Annals of Discrete Mathematics 1988; 37: 51-58. ;Brill, R. L.: A Project for the Low-Budget Mathematics Laboratory: The Game of Kalah. In: Arithmetic Teacher 1974; 21 (February): 659-661. ;Ceceri, K.: Hands-on Learning: Mancala Board Game (Column). In: Home Education Review 2008 (July-August); 32: 44-45. ;Champion, W. J.: Game Board (US D165,634). United States Patent Office, Washington DC (USA) January 8, 1952. ;Champion, W. J.: Game Counter (US 2,720,362). United States Patent Office, Washington DC (USA) October 11, 1955. ;Champion, W. J.: New or Old (Letter). Kalah Game Company, Holbrook MA (USA) 1970. ;Ching, W. E.: [http://www.math.nus.edu.sg/~urops/Projects/Kalah(Wee).pdf Analysis of Kalah]. Department of Mathematics, National University of Singapore 2000/2001. ;Cofer, A.: Mancala in Java: An Experiment in Artificial Intelligence and Game Playing. Department Honor Thesis. The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Department of Computer Science, April 1, 2003. ;De La Cruz, R. E., Cage, C. E. & Lian, M.-G. J.: Let's Play Mancala and Sungka: Learning Math and Social Skills through Ancient Multicultural Games. In: Teaching Exceptional Children 2000; 32 (3)38-42. ;Donkers, J., Uiterwijk, J. & Irving, G.: Solving Kalah. In: ICGA Journal 2000; 23 (3): 139-147. ;Fesser, M.: Entwicklung von Spielstrategien mittels evolutionärer Algorithmen am Beispiel von Kalaha. Diplomarbeit Nr. 2184. (Final Diploma Thesis). Fakultät Informatik, Elektrotechnik und Informatik, Universität Stuttgart, Stuttgart (Germany) 2004. ;Haggerty, J. B.: Kalah — An Ancient Game of Mathematical Skill. In: Arithmetic Teacher 1964; 11 (5): 326-330. ;Lehmann, E. Hicke, K. & Juhre, V.: Projekt Kalaha: Gesamtdokumentation. Rückert-Oberschule, Berlin (Germany) 2000. ;Lemaire, B.: Tutoring Systems Based on Latent Semantic Analysis. In: Lajoie, S. & Vivet, M. (Ed.). Artificial Intelligence in Education. IOS Press, Amsterdam (Netherlands) 1999, 527-534. ;Machatscheck, H.: Stein um Stein: Exotik der Brettspiele. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin (Germany) 1984, 69 & 84-87. ;Missawa, D. D. A. & Rossetti, C. B.: Desempenho de crianças com e sem dificuldades de atenção no jogo Mancala. In: Arquivos Brasileiros de Psicologia 2008; 60 (2). ;Mohammad, J. H. : The Kalah Game System Thesis (M.S.). California State University, Northridge CA (USA) 1999. ;Musumbu, K.: Kalah Game: An Application of Artificial Intelligence. In: Sveti, S. Proceedings of the International IPSI-2003 Conference. Montenegro (Yugoslavia), November 2003. ;Musumbu, K.: The Semantics of Kalah Game. In: 4th International Symposium on Information and Communication Technologies Volume 2005. ACM, 2005, 191-197. ;Neumeister, M.: Fallbasiertes Lernen von Bewertungsfunktionen (Diplomarbeit) . Universität Leipzig, Leipzig (Germany), 9. November 1998. ;Noe, T.: A Comparison of the Alpha-Beta and Scout Algorithms Using the Game of Kalah. UCLA-ENG-CSL-8017, University of California, Los Angeles (USA), 1980. ;Oon, W.-C. & Lim, Y.-J.: An Investigation on Piece Differential Information in Co-Evolution on Games Using Kalah]. In: Proceedings of Congress on Evolutionary Computation 2003; 3: 1632-1638. ;Pok Ai Ling, I.: The Game of Kalah. Department of Mathematics, National University of Singapore 2000/2001. ;Rechenberg, P.: Ein rekursives Programm fuer das Kalah-Spiel. In: Elektronische Rechenanlagen 1970; 12 (1): 11-19. ;Reutter, H.: African Game Teaches Math Strategies to Students. In: Grand Island Independent January 31, 2004. ;Ridder, J.: More Than Just a Game. In: Post-Tribune December 13, 2002. ;Ridder, J.: Mancala Helps Students to Meet State Standards. In: Post-Tribune December 20, 2002. ;Russel, R.: Kalah: The Game and the Program. In: Stanford Artificial Intelligence Project, Memo. University of Stanford, Stanford (USA) 1964 (Nr. 22). ;Russel, R.: Improvements to the Kalah Program. In: Stanford Artificial Intelligence Project, Memo. University of Stanford, Stanford (USA) 1964. ;Simister, J. L.: Learning an Evaluation Function Using a Connectionist Network: A Project in Machine Learning Based on the Game of Kalah. University of Utah, Salt Lake City UT (USA) 2004. ;Silver, Roland.: The "Kalah" Game Playing Program (Interoffice Memorandum M-1098). Maynard MA (USA) March 31, 1961. ; Slagle, J. R. & Dixon, J. K.: Experiments with the M & N Tree-Searching Program. Communications of the ACM 1970; 13 (3): 147-154. ;Weicker, K. & Weicker, N.: '' Evolving Strategies for Non-player Characters in Unsteady Environments''. In: Giacobini, M. et al (Ed.). Applications of Evolutionary Computing. Springer Verlag, Berlin & Heidelberg (Germany) 2009, 313-322. ;Zaslavsky, C.: Africa Counts: Number and Pattern in African Culture. Prindle, Weber & Schmidt, Boston (USA) 1974, 328. External Links *Kalah Java applet *[http://www.jugend-forscht.org/index.php/article/detail/790 First prize in the German Research Competition Jugend forscht] Solution to the Kalah Problem 1. F-F-E! Copyright © Wikimanqala. By: Ralf Gering Under the CC by-sa 2.5 license. Category: Dakon Variant Category: Modern Mancala Games Category: Two Rows